This Mentored Clinical Scientist Development Award application will support the career development of the candidate in the area of HIV health-related behavioral research under the primary mentorship of Dr. Susan Folkman at the University of California, San Francisco (UCSF) Center for AIDS Prevention Studies (CAPS). This award will provide the needed mentoring to focus on developing a program of research new to the candidate designed to enhance the understanding of the roles of individual differences and styles in managing HIV-related symptoms and side effects to HIV treatment regimens. The research plan is guided by a conceptual model of medical decision making in the context of stress and coping developed collaboratively by the candidate and Dr. Folkman. This research will contribute to the existing research by separately exploring coping with treatment-related side effects and disease-related symptoms. Study 1 of the proposed research plan will employ qualitative and quantitative methods to study the prevalence and meaning of side effects and symptoms among a sample of persons on highly active antiretroviral therapy (HAART), and to develop measures of appraisal and coping with side effects and symptoms (N = 100). The information from Study 1 will inform Study 2, in which the measures of appraisal and coping with side effects and symptoms will be administered to a new sample of HIV+ persons on HAART (N = 200), and relationships with medical decision making and quality of life predicted by the conceptual model will be tested. A high priority of this career development award is to submit an R01 application in which an intervention based on the findings resulting from this award will be tested in a randomized, controlled trial. Other career development activities are proposed to supplement the training obtained through conducting the proposed research projects. The ultimate goals of this award are for the Principal Investigator (PI) to (1) gain entry into an area of research new to the candidate, that is, side effects management; (2) make substantial contributions to the area of HIV research, and (3) be able to apply the acquired research skills to other areas of behavioral medicine research, thereby developing into an independent researcher in behavioral medicine.